THE Tories’ plans to slash unemployment benefit for disabled people making new claims could leave some unable to afford the essentials of life, MPs warned yesterday.

Under government plans, from April new ESA claimants assessed as fit for work will see their benefits cut by £29.05 to £73.10 per week, the same rate as jobseeker’s allowance (JSA).

The government claims the changes will help halve the “disability employment gap” — the difference between the employment rates of the disabled and non-disabled — and save the Treasury an estimated £1 billion by 2020-21.

However, the Commons work and pensions committee said the cut could leave some people with lower disposable incomes than JSA claimants as they often face unavoidably higher living costs due to their disability.

The evidence that reducing employment and support allowance (ESA) would provide an incentive for disabled people to find work was “ambiguous at best,” the report concluded.

The committee said its members had heard “substantial concerns about the possible impact of the new rate on disabled people’s capacity to look for and move into work.”

Committee chairman Frank Field said that if the government intended to proceed with the cuts “we expect an explanation of how this will not be detrimental to its target of halving the disability employment gap by making finding and keeping a job even more difficult for disabled people than it already is.”

The committee called on the government to respond to the report before the new lower rate of ESA is introduced in April.

Disabled People Against Cuts founder Linda Burnip told the Star that the Tories’ welfare changes were painting a “really grim picture” and having a “massive impact on disabled people overall.”

She said there was stark evidence that the latest round of cuts would “push people further and further into poverty” and would lead to claimants “not being able to meet their additional needs as disabled people.”

A Department for Work and Pensions spokesman said: “Our welfare reforms are increasing the support and incentives for people to move into work, while keeping an important safety net in place for those who need it.”

Alfred Morris, Baron Morris of Manchester, AO, QSO, PC (23 March 1928 –12 August 2012) was a British Labour Co-operative politician and first Britain’s Disability Minister. He was a lifetimes campaigner for all disabled.

“Show me a disabled mother, and I’ll show you a disabled family.” Alf Morris

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To support users and ex-users of psychiatric services in the Manchester area. The organisation provides a forum for services users to have a bona fide say in planning and provision of mental health services.

Protesters in King’s Lynn fight against mental health service cuts

Protesters took to the streets of King’s Lynn to voice their anger at what they described as “continuous” cutbacks to mental health services in west Norfolk.

Mental health cuts protest

A protest march against cuts to mental health services and the Fermoy Unit at the QEH took place in King's Lynn town centre. Picture: Matthew Usher.

More than 100 campaigners marched from The Walks through the town centre before finishing outside the Majestic Cinema.

Peter Smith, former parliamentary candidate for south-west Norfolk said: “We are in the fight of our lives here.”

The protest was triggered by the Fermoy Unit, an in-patient NHS facility in Lynn for mental health, which campaigners say faces an uncertain future. The unit was briefly closed to new admissions earlier this month, but reopened last week, albeit with fewer beds.

Mr Smith said: “In my lifetime we have never had to fight like this, but what is the alternative?”

But Debbie White, director of operations for Norfolk at the Norfolk and Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust, said there were now no plans to axe the Fermoy Unit.

She added: “It is right that mental health services should be valued and funded on the same level as acute health services, and it is understandable people feel passionate about the Fermoy Unit remaining open.”

Labour party activist Jo Rust insisted the issue would not disappear. She said: “They have been talking about closing it for a long time. We will fight and we will not let them do that.”

Beth Anthony, 18 of Dersingham, said: “We are here to protest against the continuous cuts to the mental health service, we think it’s unacceptable. My younger brother suffers from poor mental health and has to travel to London... That is to the detriment of my family because we have to pay for him to go down by train every single month.”